This is Why Call Tracking is Essential for Your Marketing
May 30, 2018
Conversions are the single most important metric in a lead-generation campaign. However, many businesses fail to track phone call conversions, leaving a major gap in their data. Here’s the why and how of phone call tracking for SMB lead generation campaigns.
If you’re running a lead-generation campaign online and one of your main conversions is getting phone calls – but you’re not tracking phone calls – you have no chance of accurately modifying campaigns based on the types of conversions you’re getting. Your data is one big clump.
It is, obviously, a massive oversight not to track phone calls, and most businesses realize this. Still, they don’t track phone call conversions because they don’t want to mess with call-tracking software.
But if you get a lot of phone call leads, you need to know the keywords, web pages, campaigns, and ads that drove those conversions. This is more important than ever because marketing is increasingly multi-channel, crossing search, social media, retargeting, and offline campaigns.
And the truth is that the main objection to using call tracking (that it creates a complicated jumble of phone numbers that are difficult to manage) is a fallacy. Call tracking is an automated process that integrates seamlessly into your analytics.
Google allows for this on Adwords campaigns, and Marketing 360® tracks all phone call leads by channel.
So let’s review how call-tracking works and how you can use it to improve your marketing efforts.
You Can’t Market Blind
At Marketing 360® 20-40% of our leads are call-ins. For many smaller local businesses, this number is often higher.
If a significant portion of your leads come in the form of phone calls, you really can’t manage marketing campaigns unless you track them.
We mean this in the sense that marketing is about modification. You run campaigns, analyze data, and uncover what’s most effective. If you’re not seeing half your data, then you have a blind spot that affects everything.
One of the huge advantages of digital marketing is the ability to track what people do. This doesn’t just apply to online actions. Smart businesses realize they have to track phone call conversions so they have a full picture of how their campaigns are working.
It’s Easier Than You Think
A cursory look at call tracking can make it look confusing. But if you dig into it, you’ll realize it’s not that complicated.
First, if you’re using Google Adwords, then call tracking is a built-in functionality. Here is their overview:
Call tracking is fundamental to call only campaigns, but as the video mentions, it’s also powerful because you can track call conversions on different pages of your website associated with different keywords and ads.
Furthermore, you can use call tracking numbers on your site to not only track call conversions, but also record calls. This is excellent for customer service and phone sales training.
As JB alludes to in the video, we are rolling out call tracking technology that will automatically track the channel the lead came through (social media, search, email campaign, etc) time stamp it and categorize it in our CRM software.
With the click of a button, you’ll be able to not only identify call leads but see the channel and campaign they came in through, stamped with the exact time of the phone call. That call will be recorded so you can listen to the interaction with the prospect.
That’s invaluable marketing data.
Don’t Fear the Tracker
The main objection we hear about using call tracking isn’t, in fact, that it’s too difficult to set up.
It’s an attachment to a number.
Many businesses (in particular those which have been around for years) don’t like the idea of their phone number being dynamically changed. They’re thrown-off by the idea that different numbers appear on different pages of their website or ads.
This attitude is outdated and simply incorrect.
First, you keep your actual business phone number. The dynamic tracking numbers forward to your main business number. Someone calling your actual number will, of course, reach your business.
Furthermore, today people are more likely to look you up online and click the number (like a button) than they are to save your number. Likewise, there is no business recognition with a phone number. A person isn’t going to hesitate to call you because they don’t recognize your old, local phone number.
Bottom line is that call tracking is a no-brainer, particularly when it’s included with a comprehensive marketing solution like Marketing 360®.
Calls are your hottest leads, and if you’re looking to dial-in your marketing, you need to know what channels and campaigns are generating those calls.
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